J 3,^0 The Open Court. A "VSTEEKLY JOUENAL DEVOTED TO THE RELIGION OF SCIENCE. Two Dollars per Yfear. No. 351. (Vol. VIII.— 20.) CHICAGO, MAY 17, i I I Single Copies, 5 Cents. GEN. MATTHEW MARK TRUMBULL IN MEMORIAM. THE FAREWELL AT THE HOUSE. the way of salvation. Thus Death rouses us to noble We are assembled here to pay our last tribute to aims and imparts to us the bliss of a superindividual thee, my dear friend ; but we take leave from thy body life which is attainable only through love and by ideal only, not from thy soul. We bid farewell to the aspirations. sympathetic features of thy face, but not to thy love, Death has stepped into our midst and has led away thy spiritual being, to thine own self and innermost a hero from the ranks of brave fighters, a leader in nature. Thou thyself, thy transfigured self, wilt re- battle, not only in the battles of war for the union of main with us to live in our hearts in an inseparable our country and the emancipation of the slave, but communion with our souls as a living presence to en- even more so in the spiritual battles for liberty, jus- hance, elevate, and sanctify our lives. tice, and progress. Gen. Matthew Mark Trumbull was born in London, ADDRESSES AT UNITY CHURCH. England, 1826, and came to America in his youth THE SERMON. where he began his career as a day-laborer working What is more momentous, more soul-stirring, more with pickaxe, shovel, and wheelbarrow. He then taught mysterious than Death ? school and studied law. He served as a soldier in the Death is constantly hovering over us : like the sword Mexican and in the civil war, and rising in rank was of Damocles, suspended by a hair, at any moment it finally made brigadier- general for bravery on the bat- threatens to come down upon us and destroy us. tle-field. Under General Grant he held the office of None so great, none so powerful, none so strong Collector of Internal Revenue in Iowa and devoted and healthy but are doomed at last to die and pass the rest of his life to literary work. He died in the away from the joyous light of the sun and the loving sixty-ninth year of his active life after a wearisome and circle of family and friends. in the end most painful illness, which he bore with re- What is Death ? Is it the doom that seals the van- markable endurance and patience. His death is a ity of life ? Is it nature's verdict that we are not en- sacrifice upon the altar of patriotism, for the cause of titled to an eternal individual existence ? Is it the his troubles was a severe wound received in the battle bringer of peace which after a life full of struggles bids of Shiloh. us rest from our labors? General Trumbull was strong in his convictions, partisan. allegiance was Verily, Death is all this and more ! Death is the but he was not a fanatic His great teacher of man, and the lesson which he teaches always to the broad cause of humanity. He was an because the Republican party cannot be learned to the end : it is always new when- enthusiastic Republican, ever we are again confronted with the loss of one of freed the slave. Nevertheless he was a free-trader be- our beloved ones. cause he regarded the protective tariff as a restriction Like the hierophant in the ancient mysteries of and a self-imposed shackel that prevented our people Eleusis, Death reveals to us the secrets of a higher from displaying their full energy in the competition life, teaching the thoughtless to reflect and the frivol- with other nations. He was a friend of the laborer ous to become sober. Leaving no hope to him who because the laborer is a toiler, and he knew from ex- lives for himself alone, Death advises the selfish to sur- perience what toil means. He was always willing to render their selfishness. The imminence of death re- extend his helpful services whenever needed, even at minds us to seek for that which will abide. Death a sacrifice of his strength and health ; and every one opens our eyes to spiritual truths pointing out to us in trouble was his friend. 4o8o THE OPEN COURT. General Trumbull has often been misunderstood The loss of our departed friend is irreparable to and misrepresented, but nothing could alter the dis- his family, to his now widowed wife who was the faith- ful position of his heart or make him swerve from his companion and indispensable helpmate of his life ; course to defend what he regarded as the cause of jus- to his daughters, his sons, and his grandchildren. His tice. Because he worked for the improvement of the loss is irreparable to his friends who loved him for the conditions of the laboring classes, he was branded as kindness of his heart and the brilliancy of his genius. a demagogue and a sower of discontent. How little His loss is irreparable also to me. I shall miss him this is true those know who have read his writings. and not find his like again. He was my most valuable The spirit of his books is well characterised by the fol- and intimate coworker, always ready to aid me with lowing remark in his "Wheelbarrow": his pen, or his advice whenever I needed it. The rea- "Coming out of the labor struggles of my childhood, youth, ders of The Open Court will no longer have the benefit and early manhood, covered all over \A'ith bruises and scars, and of enjoying the flashes of his inexhaustible wit with with some wounds that will never be healed either in this world which he good-humoredly pilloried the follies of our or in the world to come, I may have written some words in bitter- time. ness, but I do not wish to antagonise classes, nor to excite ani- The worth of the man shows the greatness of our mosity and revenge, I desire to harmonise all the orders of so- ciety on the broad platform of mutual charity and justice. I have loss, and we stand here as mourners complaining of had no other object in writing these essays." the curtailment of his usefulness to mankind and be- Because General Trumbull objected to creeds and wailing our bereavement. dogrnas, he has been called an infidel and an atheist. The personality of the dead, of our beloved hus- Certainly he was ready to take the odium of these band, father, and friend seems to have vanished as an names upon him, and it is true that he did not believe air-bubble that breaks up, because we observe the de- in a God who would be pleased with the flattery of cay of the body and bury the remains ; we write upon his worshippers or alter the order of nature as a spe- the tombstone his name as if he himself rested there if cial favor to supplicants ; but he did believe in the and visit the grave as we visited him. Let us open God of righteousness, charity, and love. General our eyes to spiritual facts and remember the signifi- Trumbull rejected the creeds of sectarianism because cant words spoken at the grave of him whose name to his mind they contained no religious truth, but he was has become the religious symbol of resurrection: "Why " confident that mankind would gradually adopt a broad seek ye the living among the dead ? Let us not for- cosmic religion which could stand the criticism of the get in our grief that Death is not a dissolution into infidel. His religious denomination was a faith in the nothingness ; the discontinuance of life is all that we religion of the future. He saw in the Parliament of have a right to murmur against, for the soul abideth Religions "the dawn of a new religious era, contain- and cannot be annihilated. ing less myth and more truth, less creed and more Man's real being is his soul and not the dust of deed, less dogma and more proof," and sums up his which his body consists. We bury the body and not ; opinion concerning it in these words : the soul and the soul of our beloved, departed friend "The Parliament provided a sort of intellectual crucible in is wherever his thoughts and sentiments have taken which all the creeds will be tested and purified as by fire. That root. The soul remains with the living in life ; it is sectarians of a hundred theologies have brought them to the fur- preserved in its entire individuality with all its beau- nace is a sign of social progress, and a promise of larger tolera- ties and preferences. tion. He who fears the fire has no faith, for whatsoever is true in his religion will come out of the furnace as pure metal, leaving As a stone that is built into a building loses noth- the dross to be thrown away." ing of its own being, so the souls of our ancestors are It can truly be said of General Trumbull that he preserved in the living temple of humanity forming remained a youth as long as he lived, youthful in his the foundation of a nobler future. When our life is enthusiasm for the ideals of humanity, youthful in his ended, we find a home in that great empire of soul- combative disposition, and j'outhful in the spirit with life in which have been gathered all our fathers and which he wielded his pen, always sprightly, always the fathers of our fathers since the beginning of life buoyant, always brisk and quick in his thrusts and re- upon earth.